


The Palais Fall

by mladybugg



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Depression, F/M, Original Character Death(s), Tears, so many tears
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-12
Updated: 2016-03-25
Packaged: 2018-05-26 08:31:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,502
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6231598
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mladybugg/pseuds/mladybugg
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Marinette jumped. Adrien finds out what he never could have had she stayed atop the building.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Wind

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Summary: Adrien tries. But only a fail and a fall result.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My first fanfiction (well, unless you count middle school, but let's not go there), so hopefully it isn't TOO bad.

The first time Adrien met Marinette, she jumped to a conclusion.

This time she was jumping to her death.

The hissing wind whipped through Adrien's hair, sending his light jacket in a whirlwind around his chest. He struggled to see between his eyelashes, the strong force of air threatening again to send him down onto the busy unsuspecting Parisians below them.

His feet pushed past the wind one step at a time. “Marinette!”

She stood at the edge of the Palais Garnier, her small feet just inches away from a fate that would send her spiraling down past the statues and the luminescent engraved lightposts that would be the showcase to her end below.

Her hair was down, and thrashing in the wind. Her body whispered surrender, but grew stiff in response to his voice.

She slowly spun around. “Adrien?” He had seen her eyes grow wide and sparkle with some kind of expressed excitement whenever he walked into their classroom. He had witnessed her pink cheeks redden into roses, and her sweet delicate smile grow like a tender blossom whenever she attempted to talk to him.

But this time, Marinette’s eyes remained dark, shadowed by black circles underneath. Her cheeks were horribly pale, and her mouth did not greet him with a smile.

“Adrien, what are you doing here.” She phrased it as a disappointed rhetorical statement rather than a true inquisition, but he answered anyway.

“It was Alya. She told me she was worried about you but couldn’t help you. She said I might be able to do something, even if no one else could.”

  
Marinette seemed to be caught off guard by her friend's name. 

“I always knew you were having a hard time after your parents died. No one should have to go through that.”

Adrien took a step closer to her. She stepped closer to the edge.

He stopped dead in his tracks, and tried to pour more sincerity into his voice. “Marinette, I understand what it is like to lose someone. Please, I really do.”

Her eyes turned forlorn. “No, this time you really don't,” she spoke with a longing, as if she wished he really did know.

He clenched his jaw as various uncertain things to say to her whirled around in his mind. “Marinette, I just need you to understand! I-”

She shook her head, her loose hair whipping at her neck and face. Then her features changed from pitiful to a limp resignation. She turned and before he could take another step, whispered just loud enough for me to hear her over the wind. “You don’t have a clue, Adrien. You never have, and you never will.”

And with those final words, Marinette Dupain-Cheng jumped.


	2. The Funeral

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adrien is sad. Then everyone is sad.

Adrien couldn’t find the strength to stand, let alone dress himself in the black funeral clothes draped atop his pure white couch.

Sleep had avoided him last night. It had avoided him for the past week. When it came time for Natalie to knock on the door and let him know it was the time to rise, he made no sound. The days she actually opened the door a fraction, Adrien could hear her breathe for a moment or two, then retreat downstairs while calling his father to tell him his son just wasn’t ready yet.

Even Plagg didn’t nap on his face or pester him hourly for snacks as he had for the months they had been together. Now wasn’t the time to approach the boy at all, and even this certain black feline could recognize that.

Adrien didn’t dare shut his eyes for fear of a scene replaying in his head again. He hadn’t known what to do or what to say. He hadn’t been prepared for that conversation: his weak entreatings, her hollow expression, her last step before… before…

He really shouldn’t have looked over the edge.

Adrien instead turned his heavy gaze to the suit that Natalie had left. The couch it lay on was pure spotless white: a trait he had always been proud of maintaining, but now only saw as a color – or rather, the lack of. It was so blinding, yet so empty, and reminded him of himself. A model. Ha. What could he do? He could pose and appear great for the flashing lights and the giant billboards, but when it came down to it, he couldn’t even say some comforting words to someone he could once say was one of his few real friends.

Adrien slumped even farther under his blankets and continued to study the scene. The white furniture was a stark opposite of the midnight suit it supported. It reminded Adrien of her hair. It had always bounced with her step and shone in the light whenever Adrien had seen her. But that day as the wind whipped it around her pale features, there had been no shine to spot.

“Are you going to go?” A single voice rang out from the silence Adrien had gotten used to. He rolled his blonde head upwards to see his kwami floating above his head. “You went through something that really sucked, true. But you need to stop moping around and go. You owe her that.”

His blatant words didn’t even faze Adrien, but his point did. “But do you honestly think her uncle or, frankly, anyone will want to see me after I was the last one who…” Adrien didn’t let himself finish the thought. He blankly stared at his ceiling, trying to clear his mind instead.

Plagg fell to his forehead with a thump. “Don’t you try to disappear into no man’s land again, Adrien.” His little tail rose with a start, and he smiled a sharp toothed grin. “What would Ladybug think?”

Adrien sat up, sending the kwami on a quick trip to the end of his bed. His muscles were weary but stable. “Ladybug wouldn’t care. She would understand.”

Plagg flew across the room and gently lighted upon the black suit. “And yet you are up.”

\----------------------------

 

The moment Adrien opened the car door, he regretted it. He hesitated for a moment as he considered the option of staying in his dimly lit vehicle and telling the driver to take him home. _You owe her that._ Plagg’s words rang in his head. He could do it, too. He shook his head and stepped onto the wet sidewalk.

It was raining. Of course it was. Black umbrellas entered through the large doors one at a time, shaking the water droplets loose before collapsing the thin shelter. He could hear the faint sound of thunder coupled with the splash of rain hitting the roof of the building and running down the sides into long rivers than traced down the walkway and into the street. The sounds filled his ears and made him feel as if he were drowning in a never-ending river of tears. The heavens were weeping for her as well.

He recalled a simple precious memory. When he had his first real conversation with her, it had been raining like this. He had said a few words, opened his umbrella and handed it to her, then rushed away in the rain. He did not open his umbrella today.

When he reached the doors, he was soaked. He walked past the coat closets and entered the hall where people dressed in dark garments littered the sides. He saw the familiar faces of schoolmates from other classes among them. Most were looking down. Others looked at him – some with pity, some with a scornful glance.

“-tracking in all of that water. Why is he so drenched, he has an umbrella! Has he no respect?”

“I hear that Agreste child was the last one to-“

“Where is his father? Is he alone?”

Adrien had to almost grow accustom to people staring and whispering about him as he passed, pretending never to notice. However, this time in his already weakened state, the mutters could penetrate right past his fragile exterior. Of course his father didn’t come. He didn’t have time for his own son, even when he had been bedridden for a week. As long as he had a strong grip on everything Adrien did, he could care less about some funeral for one of his friends.

The main room was even worse. He could spot the faces he knew better: Jukeka, Mylene, Alix, Max, Nathanael – Oh God, _Nathanael_. He perhaps looked worse than Adrien did. He sat at a low table, his sullen cheeks and haunted green eyes facing a blank sketchpad. He barely seemed to breathe.

Adrien could see Wang Cheng, the famous chef and the one who had taken his great-niece in, despite the language barrier, resting against a precipice, holding a wineglass in his hand. He did not drink.

  
Worst of all was Alya Cesaire. He had heard her sobs echoing down the hall, but could now see the origin. She sat crouched over an ebony casket, her arms leaning over the sides. Her entire body shuddered with each wrenching sob. Her red hair was damp and hung around her face like a blanket from the rest of the world, shielding her from them.

Adrien made his way through the room. It was like wading upstream through a neck-deep angry river. Every step was painstakingly difficult and harder to press forward. He passed the empty stares of strangers and friends and felt grateful that no one looked up. He felt it hard to use his aching lungs.

His heart felt as if it was burning. Perhaps I am going to die right here, right now, Adrien dimly thought. _Maybe God will strike me down here and now for my useless attempt at a life._ Here we had a girl who could laugh and smile like the sun, and he was the one left standing.

All the breath left inside of him departed with one final instant as her body came into view. He could see her face. Her eyes were closed in a peaceful yet staged expression. Her hair was pulled into pigtails, just like she always wore it. So unlike the last time he had seen her.

His legs suddenly lacked strength and he found himself stumbling. With his heart in his chest, he managed to right himself in time, but Alya had noticed him now.

Adrien’s heart gave another shudder at her appearance. The red haired girl gazed up at him first with awful bloodshot eyes that had cried countless tears. She seemed desperate in a way Adrien had never seen her before. This strong-willed adolescent who had chased after supervillains and laughed in the face of eminent death had been reduced to a crumpled mess that lay before him. But quickly her expression turned to one of rage.

She jumped to her feet. “ _You!”_ She cried, pointing a shaking finger at Adrien’s chest. “You couldn’t do _one_ thing that I asked you to do!” her voice was rising to a shriek. “I should have gone instead! Maybe I could have done something! Anything. Because obviously sending you was a mistake. She was just so down that day that I was worried but she wasn’t this bad. I bet you made it worse! Marinette would never do something like _this_!” She was nearly screaming at Adrien.

Marinette. _Marinette. **Marinette**_. The name felt like a stab in the gut. He realized with a start that he hadn’t said her name since it happened. Those three syllables were more than just a name. They were the name of a dear friend. Someone who had stood before him, and then had been gone as quickly as gravity could take her. What had he done for her? He had tried, it was true. But he was too weak. He had made it out of his room and to this funeral for Marinette, because he owed her. But was it more than just his inability to help? Did he owe her more than just a visit? Why had she jumped? Could he have been more than just a lack of help, but the cause itself?

There was a ringing in his ears and he felt as though his head was being suffocated. Everything was hitting him at once as he stood there facing the fury of Marinette’s best friend.

Then Chloe Bourgeois walked through the door.

“God, it looks like a funeral in here. What is that smell?” The brightly dressed blonde swerved around a sniveling child, “Ugh, someone wipe that poor child’s nose. How disgusting,” She glanced at the nervous tag-a-long who trailed behind her, “Oh _do_ hurry, Sabrina. Stop looking so scared, sure we totally crashed their party, but what could they possibly to _me_?” If Adrien had received glares and mutterings, Chloe was the object of nearly three times the amount.

Then she spotted Adrien and made an automatic beeline for him. “Well hiiiiiiiii, Adrien! It’s just been forever. I know you must have missed me, I’m sure.” Then she paused as she neared close enough to see the open casket and Marinette inside.

She faltered for only a moment. As her face focused on the pale face of her once enemy, her posture sank but a centimeter. However, the look in her usually bright blue eyes had a certain cloudy demeanor.

“Chloe?” Sabrina asked timidly, glancing around again.

And then Chloe was back.

The blonde held out a perfectly manicured hand. “Sabrina, bring my phone to me. I want to take a pic with the star of the week.” She pushed the gaping Alya aside. Adrien could understand the utter shock Alya felt towards the scene before them. Chloe was Chloe. But this was taking things far beyond even the line a Bourgeois should cross.

Sabina hadn’t moved. Chloe flashed her a warning smile, her hand still outstretched. “I am waiting, Sabrina.” Shaking, her friend gently placed the electronic in her waiting hand, then backed away rapidly.

“Who is class president now?” she grinned. And thus, with a swipe of her hand and a flash from her screen, Chloe had taken an actual selfie with Marinette.

This was the end of the road for Alya.

“Actually _, I am_.” She spat. She pushed her way to the blonde and had her arm outstretched to strike when another fist met Chloe’s cheek first. She was sent flying, narrowly missing the black casket. Her white sunglasses spun under a table across the room. She looked up in horror.

Adrien stood there, panting. His shaking fingers were still curled in a rigid fist. “How dare you,” he hissed. “Get out. Get out right now.” For the first time in a very long time, Chloe looked genuinely terrified. Her eyes were wide.

“I – I just wanted to see her too,” she spoke in a quiet whisper.

Then Chloe stood and walked out of the room and down the hall. She didn’t not stop for Sabrina to supply her with an umbrella before she closed the door into the downpour outside. Her friend anxiously scanned the room again, swallowed, and rushed to follow.

The room was no longer silent. Classmates stood staring up at him while a chorus of sudden chatter arose among the others. Wang Cheng had dropped his glass of wine, and was now covering his face with his large hands, rocking back and forth on his feet. Nathanael had never once looked up.

Adrien couldn’t look at Alya. Instead, he took his black umbrella and enfolded it. He gently placed it at the head of the casket, just shading Marinette’s resting face. He paused a moment. There was something about Marinette that had always been untamable. Something had always resided behind those bright blue eyes of hers. But now the fire hadn’t been tamed. It had been extinguished. Adrien stepped back.

They had started under this umbrella. And now she had it again. This time, he would not be taking it back.

Adrien walked out of the room, down the hall, and outside. He did not call Natalie or anyone to pick him up. He would not be returning home for a while.

“Plagg, transform me.”

Above the casket, the umbrella suddenly clasped shut. But there was no one to catch it. It fell to the floor, and no one dared pick it up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quite a bit longer!! My friend said she would have cried in the last chapter if it wasn't so short so... Tada!!!  
> So much sadness... I know... I played rainymood.com the entire funeral scene to get me more in the mood (the crying mood)  
> I am trying to crank out a chapter a week, but with school and my other novel that I am writing... I will do my best. More to come!


	3. The Question

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chat thinks a lot and flies a lot.

Chat Noir soared above the apartments and tall multi-story buildings. The wind felt different today, or at least he was determined to make it feel that way. The hero needed to feel the air of his protected city.

As a child, he had always looked up at the Eiffel Tower and the clouds and the sunsets just about anything that was out of his reach, which was just about everything. His mother loved to tell him about the artwork the gods had molded intricately into each white puff in the sky. She always held out his hand and point with a delighted shine in her eyes at each daybreak and nightfall and try to name every shade the sky presented. He rarely understood the detailed colors she named, but he loved listening to the strange syllables roll off her tongue. His father, well he hadn’t been around much then. He only stopped once to shoo off her romantic musings when his son began shooting his little fingers at the winged pigeons above him. _“You are not to go near those. They are disgusting and will make you uncomfortable.”_ But Adrien couldn’t help but be transfixed by the way they could see his world completely opposite of how he did.

“ _What did it feel like? Why would they ever want to land? Could I learn to fly, mama?”_

 _“Why yes, darling. Perhaps one day you could.”_ Indeed, Adrien had learned. All it took was the help from a kwami, a ring, and a transformation and off he could go, staff in hand, as far up as he could dream. Normally his Chat hours were spent swinging around, busily battling monsters, but every so often he still snuck out to just get a breath of fresh air.

He inhaled deeply now, letting the air smooth past his nose and through his lungs. He felt as if he hadn’t fully breathed in over a week, which was, perhaps, true.

The cool air brushed past his suit, causing his ruffled hair to shuffle around his ears. For only a moment, Chat closed his eyes and let the air take him where it would. He trusted this force, he loved the feeling of flying more than anything. He felt he could let go, if only gravity wasn’t an inevitable force that could take away his peace and throw him to the ground in an inexcusable heap just like –

His eyes flung open and he peered down at the buildings rushing by. He swiftly landed on a level rooftop. Chat only realized he had been smiling when he felt it revert into a neutral frown.

Deep down in his heart, Chat knew he _needed_ to talk to Ladybug. He had barely spoken at all since the incident, let alone about what had happened. It was true, Ladybug wasn’t always there when he had something to say. Usually she was running off after a fight, dancing just out of his reach to the chime of her miraculous. But now and again, he could catch his Lady without the pretense of a fight. During these rare occasions, he had delved some personal thoughts he had never dared share with anyone else. She always managed to dodge questions about herself, but listened intently to what he himself had to say.

He had just walked away from a funeral. Every ounce of his body and soul needed to talk to her. To have her listen. To touch her. To just _see_ her.

After all, it had been far too long since he had seen her last. On top of his own trials, he had seriously begun to worry. For the last few battles, his partner had never shown up, and for someone as vital as she, Ladybug’s absence was a disaster.

Chat his first solo battle with a shudder. It had gone on for hours. He had fought and dodged and darted around, the nervous anticipation growing in his chest. _She’ll be here_ , he had told himself over and over, something must have just held her up. _I have been late many times before_. However, as the clock ticked on and the villain only grew tougher, Chat only grew weaker. But what could he do? After all, Chat was supposed to be the one holding it off until she came and saved the day. Without her, he had only the power of destruction. Without her Miraculous, what could he do about the akuma? Without Ladybug, he had no plan, no direction, no lucky charm, no shining light of hope to guide him through the Paris streets. But nevertheless, there he had been.

After using Cataclysm on a barrage of flying cars to save a pedestrian family, he had rushed to an abandoned alley where Plagg had let him in on a previously trivial secret. At the bottom of his staff was a small holding container. Should he capture the akuma, he could trap it in there… and have Ladybug purify it next time. This turned out to be his saving grace. He had crushed the bracelet singlehandedly and just managed to seize the dark butterfly in time before it flew off to create even more trouble for the sole hero.

But Chat had still stuck around, after the reporters had sent a hellfire of questions upon him, after the city volunteers stuck around to clean up the remains of debris unfixed by Miraculous, after the sun went down. He waited. Ignoring the increasing trouble he would be in when he returned home, and waited for her to suddenly appear and calm his troubled heart. But his lady never came.

 _I know our last fight together should have been traumatic for her_ , he had realized. It’s not as if Chat himself would ever forget the sight that that night. But Ladybug had already left when he had heard the scream and ran to the horrific display. He wasn’t even sure Ladybug knew what had really happened that night. But either way, to suddenly stop saving Paris wasn’t the Ladybug he knew.

He had returned home with a heavy heart and a very worried conscience.

And Ladybug had not appeared to a battle for nearly a month.

With one treasured friend gone, Chat didn’t know if he could bear the loss of his best friend. The thought crossed his mind that perhaps he would never see her again, that he would continue this waiting game forever and never know why. He quickly shook his head with a violent wind. No, he had faith in Ladybug.

 

Perhaps if she doesn’t fight, she may still sneak out, just as he was.

He thought of spots he had come across his suited partner. The lot outside the Notre Dame, the top of the Eiffel Tower, the north end of Paris’ Central Park, the rooftop of the Palais Garnier… oh, he preferred not to think of that one now. It had been a warm, almost romantic night with Ladybug but now that location had been effectively ruined for him.

With a faint hope in his step, Chat sprung off the rooftop and began making his way across the city to various sites. In each, he strained his already heightened cat eyes for a spotted crimson figure. But the hero came up with only lost time.

As he sat perched upon the Eiffel Tower, he noticed the sudden swarm of cameras and reporters below him. With one swift gesture, he was on the ground and instantly surrounded by personnel.

The first question was the one at the foremost of his mind.

“Where is Ladybug?”

The next were to be expected.

“Will you be on your own from now on?”

 “Have you contacted Ladybug?”

“Do you think this has to do with the night that couple was killed under your watch?”

“Is being a hero only temporary? Will you disappear as well?”

“You have been sighted at many locations today, could you be looking for your partner?”

“What should the city do regarding the amount of destruction villains are able to cause to the city now?”

“Could this disappearance have anything to do with the death of Marinette Dupain-Cheng?”

This last question struck Chat to the bone. His head swung in the direction of the voice, and he made his way through curious interviewers, ignoring the haughty looks as he brushed them aside. There, in the back of the group stood Alya Cesaire.

Loyal to her post, the blogger was out trying to find answers. But the girl who always stood in the front of the pushy reporters, waving her own camera or microphone with a passionate thrill written across her face now stood with limp posture with tired eyes up at Chat. She seemed to have patched herself up some since the funeral earlier that day.

“What could she possibly have to do with Marinette?” He reminded himself that he knew Marinette inside the suit as well as out.

Chat’s red haired school mate swallowed. “Well, Ladybug disappeared after Marinette’s parents were brutally killed by Clockisima. She reportedly wasn’t present when the scene was discovered, but who isn’t to say that our hero heard of this and began to doubt herself?”

“ _Ladybug_? _Doubt_ herself?” A nearby reported scoffed.

“Here me out. Ladybug is fierce and strong and brave, but isn’t it possible that hearing she had failed someone could make her rethink how much good she can actually do to Paris? She always feels like she has to protect _everyone_. And when she failed… If I know Ladybug, something like this could really, _really_ get to her.”

Chat leaned forward and furrowed his brow. “But-”

“And don’t you think that their daughter’s death, whose only known reason to kill herself was her unfortunate parent’s demise would permanently convince her that she has completely failed, do you?” With this, Alya looked Chat straight in mask eyes as if to stare directly at Adrien.  

A chill traced down Chat’s spine.

He had no response for Alya. _Could she be right?_  he thought. It was true that the more his partner didn’t appear, the more people were hurt in battles. But he could imagine Ladybug stuck on those two she had failed. He could see her trying to do something to repair her mistake. But something had gone wrong and Marinette… Marinette could possibly be the last straw.

He knew it was a stretch. But he felt that was the closest possible scenario.  

There was more to her suicide than her parents, he felt and knew it deep inside. He was going to find out the real reason Marinette killed herself for all those left in the dark: her friends, her uncle, Ladybug, and himself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YOU WOULD THINK I COULD MANAGE TO WRITE MORE THAN ONE CHAPTER DURING MY SPRING BREAK, but no. This was honestly at the top of my to do list so... there goes my homework plans...  
> There were so many flashbacks in this chapter. Buuuuuuut get used to it. There's gonna be plenty more where that came from.  
> I feel like the lack of dialogue is getting very tiring. But dialogue is coming soon, trust me pleaseee  
> Also, I feel like this chapter was kind of confusing... if you have any questions you should ask me, maybe I could clear some of it up in the next few chapters.
> 
> Also, howdy hiatus! You suck! What is going to be my new favorite day of the week when I don't have my baby Miraculous to wake up to every Sunday?? Well, I did start watching quite a bit of American cartoons, currently on Steven Universe... we shall see where THAT ONE takes us...


End file.
